He's the man, yes! But I'm dissapointed in his spring season so far. Got troubled with some stomach problems both in tour of Flandres and Milan-Sanremo. Kristoff has been the best Norwegian cyclist so far this season. But I miss the glory days of Hushovd. Unfortunately he's on the downside of his career.

I know we are all over the Cruz situation, but this article nicely sums up my thoughts on Cruz's situation

Quote:

With time running out, Cruz must make decision on Giants offer

Paul Schwartz
Follow Paul on Twitter
Blog: Giants

It Is tough to learn you are not worth what you think you are, which is why Victor Cruz is finding it so difficult to accept an offer that Giants owner John Mara aptly says will make the 26-year old receiver “a very wealthy young man.’’

The Giants want to make Cruz rich, but he wants to become richer. This does not make Cruz greedy and no doubt is exceedingly frustrating to him, and also humbling.

Cruz is learning the hard way that as a restricted free agent he is far more restricted than free. It has been 10 years since any NFL team gave up a first-round draft pick to sign a restricted free agent. One week from today, it is going to be 11 years.

Cruz has until next Friday to sign an offer sheet with a team able to give him more than the Giants are offering and also willing to lose a first-round pick to the Giants as compensation. It’s not going to happen. This scenario is playing out precisely as expected, leaving Cruz with two options as he readies for the 2013 season with the Giants.

There is a standing offer from the Giants averaging slightly more than $7 million per year, believed to be a four- or five-year deal worth between $29 and $36 million, with $12 million to $15 million in guaranteed money.

Cruz, after not getting a sniff of another offer, can sign that deal or else sign the one-year tender that will pay him $2.879 million and allow him to become an unrestricted free agent after the 2013 season. Of course, the Giants for 2014 could designate Cruz their franchise player, meaning they essentially can block him from going elsewhere until 2015.

The Giants’ offer is solid but hardly breathtaking, which is why Cruz feels he deserves more. After all, he can look at other receivers who are in the big-bucks stratosphere and correctly point out he has accomplished more.

Cruz the past two seasons has caught more passes for more yards and more touchdowns than Vincent Jackson, Dwayne Bowe and DeSean Jackson, plus Cruz gets bonus points for doing it for a championship team. All three signed deals for more than $10 million a year, but the Giants aren’t going there.

They view Cruz as a tremendous receiver but know Hakeem Nicks needs a new contract after this season and want to retain both of them. They also know Nicks was a first-round draft pick, Cruz went undrafted and that if they have to sacrifice losing one for keeping the other, they believe Nicks is the more dangerous and more difficult to replace, assuming he is healthy.

Cruz would be wise to try to get the Giants to bump up their offer a bit — a possibility with newly hired agent Tom Condon now running the financial show — then sign on the line. Cruz was a rookie in 2010 when Steve Smith rejected a six-year, $36 million offer ($15 million of it guaranteed) after his record-breaking 2009 season. Smith tore up his knee and the past two years was forced to bottom-feed in free agency, signing minimal one-year deals with the Eagles and Rams, the pot of gold he eschewed gone forever.

There is no need for Cruz to take a similar risk, not when in New York he can more than make up the financial difference in endorsements that flow to him like autograph-seekers.

The Giants open up their offseason workouts on Monday, and all eyes will be on whether or not Cruz shows up. What’s the big deal? This is a voluntary program and if Cruz doesn’t have a contract there is no reason he has to attend — especially next week, with the restricted free agent period still ongoing.

Justin Tuck yesterday at an appearance in Staten Island told reporters he believes the best way to settle the situation is for Cruz “to be there in good faith,’’ but that’s missing the point. Cruz this week showed up at a passing camp at Duke to catch a few balls from Eli Manning. Everyone knows he wants to stay in blue. The Giants aren’t going to be bent out of shape by a few missed April workouts.

Cruz did everything right the past two years and figured he would be rewarded. He is not going to cash in quite the way he envisioned, but he is in position to set himself up for life, meaning he certainly can come out of this a big winner.

Anyone good with images and photoshop? My GB break down has images that are very large compared to the norm. Anyone know why that happens?

Can anyone fix those sheets for me?

what you need to do is to reduce the size, this can be done easily in something like paint, open the file, click resize. pixels gives you an idea of the size of an image, but resize using percentage to make sure you keep the aspect ratio.

If your image files are large it is likely due to the resolution of the image, what you will need to do is reduce the resolution in something like photoshop.
The standard resolution for websites is 72dpi if you have more than that and only which to use it online it is probably unneccessary.

We may this time because Ryan Nassib is a developmental QB. If Eli got hurt, it's pointless to play him right away because he is learning. I think this year you keep Carr, because he knows the system. Later in a year or two, you keep two having confidence in Nassib. I think this year you have to carry 3 QBs.

So I got a chance to check out Damontre Moore a little more. My scouting of him was very limited in the past, I honestly never thought he'd be there for us, and I also didn't think he was on our radar so I just never bothered.

I really like this guy. I hate to use comparisons like this, but he plays a lot like DeMarcus Ware. He's thick, has really long arms, he bends just like Ware, he extends just like Ware, he can slant inside with power, he's got good punch, he's explosive off the line, what I like the most is his bend. I think that's a very underrated trait that pass rushers must have and he has it.

And he's only 20! He's already bulked up to 260, and the Giants are gonna put another 5 to 10 lbs on him. He's gonna be a beast.

Now I tried evaluating him with his speed in mind. I wanted to see if I could see the concerns. And while he ran slow at the combine, he doesn't play slow. He's not Dwight Freeney, but he's not slow. He comes off the line fast, and he's got power, and he can convert speed to power well.

He lacks top end speed, which explains his 4.9. He plays more like a 4.8, I attribute the 4.9 to a poor work ethic. He's fast off the line with average chase speed. But that's not a big deal. If you win early, you don't need to be a burner and he wins early.

Not a great tackler, he needs to work on that. He can develop a spin move. He'll get stronger, that's not a concern. Most of his issues are very correctable, and I think we got a steal.

Remember, this kid is only 20. His style of play is very similar to Ware. Not the athlete that Ware was, but he's a very good athlete in his own right. I think we got a steal here.

All his issues are very correctable in our program. He'll get stronger, Coughlin will keep his ass in gear. We got a steal.

I also got to check out Nassib. To be honest, outside of the limited time I spent watching qbs on TV, I did not scout any QBs in this draft. So after we drafted him, I went and checked him out.

He has a strong arm! I kept hearing arm strength issues, I didn't see it at all with Nassib. He made the deep out with consistency, he has plenty of arm strength.

I'm surprised this guy fell to the 4th. He had no business being a 4th round pick. We stole him to be honest. He has a lot of issues that are very correctable.

Watch the USC game. This guy had accuracy issues, but it's all mechanics. And a lot of those mechanics broke down bc he was running for his life. And his WRs were AWFUL! Couldn't catch a cold.

I was very impressed with his poise. This guy was playing Goliath and he kept fighting. That's a trait you want to see in a qb. He had good pocket presence. He tried making things happen. He has the arm strength. Accuracy issues are very correctable and he has the time to develop that muscle memory sitting behind Eli.

Very smart, made his progressions, has the body to be great. Has the arm, and the guy played on a horrible team. Look what they were before him, and look what they were with him. He's a winner, he made the program better, and he's battle tested. He can play in all weather conditions, and hes definitely the type of player who's gonna be a better pro than college player.

I really am shocked that he was there in the 4th. This is not your typical 4th round qb. He should have been at worst a 3rd round pick, and I see a lot of promise with him.

If we didn't have Eli, I actually would be excited to see this guy play. I really think he can develop into a quality qb.

And it's a shame that those qb needy teams passed on him for 3 rounds. That's why bad organizations stay bad. How can you pass on this guy when you need a qb? This guy has a lot of potential.

Now I see why the Giants felt they had to take him. This guy is not a 4th round qb.

Im actually pretty excited to see him develop. I think he has potential. I always thought he didnt have arm strength, which is why I didn't care much for him. But that's not true at all. This guy has plenty of arm.

Doesn't set the edge. He's very capable of setting the edge, but he doesn't do it, he shoots down the field and plays the run on the way to the qb.

When the RB is in his trajectory he's good at bringing him down. He's good at stopping the run when he slants inside and tries to blow up the point of attack, but if he's in a bad angle, he's not a great tackler so he doesn't take advantage of those long arms as well as he could, and he doesn't stack and shed the way he should.

So he needs to work on that. Very correctable. The strength and length is there to be a good run stuffer. He just has to work on technique. JPP had a similar problem and he is a beast vs the run now. I think we can correct Moore the same way. He has the tools, he just has to get coached up.